Forum:44: Education and Secrecy
The party, on attempting to leave the strange enclave of mysterious animal people warped by Pandemonium, was attacked by the nameless fish-creature that supposedly occupied the jail of the Tzen royal palace. The party fought to a near-standstill, though the creature was capable of spreading terrible poisons that impeded their attempts. Eventually, it retreaded into a cloud of poison mist, and the party realized that they would need to move on to their destination or they would be continually harried by the monster's attacks. They arrived at the mountain of the animal creature's gods by the late afternoon, and on attempting to find a point of entry or climbing, were contacted by Gabe, the servant of Genbu. He told the group that Genbu was interested in providing them with some knowledge of the creatures that they were fighting, but that they would have to enter the mountain and follow Gabe's instructions to do so. Upon entry, however, Gabe seemed confused and disoriented by his surroundings, and told the party that they would have to bypass a defense mechanism since Pandemonium was trying to contact them. The party was given the option of proceeding through three doors, and told that they would have to pass through whatever challenges lay before them. The three doors were marked with a triangle, a square, and a hexagon. The party traveled through the triangle door first, where they fought three angelic-looking statues with some limited guidance from Gabe, as they were experiencing causality in reverse compared to their opponents. They then went through the square door, where they appeared in some sort of manor decorated with paintings depicting a family of four, though the wife's image was crudely stricken from the paintings. The party grasped, based on the available evidence, that the family was Lordinian nobility and the missing wife was Edith Harper, the Librennian spymaster. The challenge was to pass through each doorway in the manor house exactly once, though it became apparent after some investigation that it was impossible to do so. The party thus found that the solution was to destroy a wall in order to escape. Throughout the adventure, the party also found themselves hearing a strange voice that called out to them...---------------------------------------------------- Upon escaping the final room, Gabe released them from the Negative Space and the party found themselves back outside, though the mountain had disappeared and was replaced by a crater. At this time, the figure of Lin's master made itself known to them, and he offered Lin the whole story for making the journey to find him. However, before doing so, they were attacked once more by the fish creature, though Master Luo killed it with a strike that removed its heart, which, to Lin's horror, he consumed ravenously. He was once called Ren Luo and was an adventurer some time past. He traveled with Chandra Prithivi, the Rani of Tzen, and the lot of them sought to contact the beast-people of southern Zhou. However, he was killed by the fish creature that fought the party, and it consumed his heart. The rest of his body, however, was eaten by a white carrion bird, and he was reborn. He lived among the beast people and in so doing developed a strong antipathy towards the people of Tzen, so he returned there and used his influence over Chandra and his childhood friend General Jayendra to convince the Raja of Tzen to lead another expedition to the south. This one, however, he used as a pretext to lead the Seven Sainted Beasts and the other beast-people to ambush and slaughter the explorers, though he spared Chandra for a time upon learning she was pregnant. The child was Lin, and after ensuring her daughter's safety, Chandra surrendered to Luo, who devoured her. Luo, however, could not bring himself to harm Lin, and instead raised her, hoping that she would become a powerful warrior for the beast-people that could help him destroy the remainder of Tzen. However, she grew up with a strong sense of empathy and justice, and instinctively resisted Luo's attempts to have her consume human flesh in order to turn her into a beast. He said that this was evidence of the human gods' love for her, and this was only confirmed when he received a letter addressed to her... At this, Luo decided that if Lin were to be a warrior who could avenge the people of Tzen, then he could only offer her one last duty as her master. He then revealed his true form as the Gray Corpse-Eater, one of the Seven Sainted Beasts, and told Lin that his life would be his final offering to her, and that she would have to hone her blade and train her body like never before if she hoped to end his reign of terror. He flew away, leaving the tattered remnants of his gi behind, and Lin remembered something of great importance. "To save him, you will need a blade that can cut through fate..." Rewards from the game as follows: *7500 EXP each: +3000 EXP each for engaging the fish-monster +5000 EXP each for completing 2/3 challenges of Genbu -500 EXP each for encountering ---------------------